Mitchell/Rosetta Stone: Romney 36%, Santorum 33% en Michigan

The New Republic:

Fueled by a strong debate performance Wednesday night, Mitt Romney continues to lead Rick Santorum in the latest Mitchell/Rosetta Stone Poll of Michigan conducted for MIRS (Michigan Information & Research Service) the night after the CNN Debate. The two front runners are still in a statistical dead heat, although Romney (36%) has increased his lead by 1% over Rick Santorum (33%) while Ron Paul (12%) replaced Newt Gingrich (9%) in third place. Undecided voters dropped in half to 11%.

(...) “Romney’s lead seems to have solidified after real volatility over the past two weeks. Romney has made big inroads with conservatives over the past ten days: Santorum’s 16% lead among Tea Party voters has been erased and he is now tied with them; his 16% lead with Evangelical Christians has now been cut in half to 8%, and Santorum’s 31% lead with self-identified “very conservatives” has now been cut to 13%. Romney had to persuade fiscal and social conservatives that he was more conservative than they thought he was. He also had to persuade them that Santorum was not as conservative as Santorum said he was. Romney seems to be accomplishing both those tasks,” Steve Mitchell, president of Mitchell Research & Communications, Inc. said.

John Garst, President of Rosetta Stone Communications in Atlanta, said “Romney was the clear winner in the debate last night. A third of the voters (33%) said that Romney won compared to only 13% who said Santorum, 10% who said Paul, and 9% who said Gingrich. Almost one in ten voters said they switched their support as a result of the debate. Of those that switched, Romney (27%) was leading Paul (24%), Santorum (22%) and Gingrich (11%). That would explain a slight uptick in Romney’s lead from a survey we conducted Monday night.”